


the down high

by Snowsheba



Series: gency week [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: AU where Hanzo doesn't kill Genji, Dancing, F/M, Gency, and Genji doesn't join Blackwatch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-02
Updated: 2017-07-02
Packaged: 2018-11-22 12:03:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11379813
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snowsheba/pseuds/Snowsheba
Summary: She enters his life as quickly as she leaves it, and all that’s left is a single, perfect white feather.He remembers her, foolhardy as it is.





	the down high

**Author's Note:**

> this was going to be so much longer - like an entire fic where genji is the shimada inside man at overwatch longer - and then i was like 'hm. a later project, maybe.'
> 
> prompt today was **feathers**. it took me six tries to get something i liked.

It’s at one of his clan’s international gatherings that he sees her.

“Hanzo,” he says, gently elbowing his brother in the side. When his brother hums acknowledgement, Genji discreetly gestures to her, to her entourage, and asks, “Who are they?”

His brother has always been better at preparing for events such as these – at preparation for a life in the yakuza in general, really. He waits, patiently, as Hanzo glances over, eyes narrowing as he flicks through a mental guest list, and after a few moments, he looks at Genji and says, “They are representatives from Overwatch. We invited them cordially in hopes to negotiate a truce of sorts.”

“That seems dangerous,” Genji observes, because having an international peacekeeping organization at a dressed-up party for an international criminal organization is not likely to end well.

“A risk Father was willing to take,” Hanzo says, and then, “If you wish to speak with them, you might as well. Perhaps you will pick up on something of interest.”

That is the closest Hanzo can get to saying _you can go_ without potentially getting in trouble with the elders; Genji briefly presses his shoulder against his brother’s, a quiet show of gratitude, and begins to walk, popping a grape into his mouth. People part before him as he goes, even though they know he isn’t the true heir of Shimada - he still holds considerable power over most people in this room, and this has become such an ingrained truth in his mind that he doesn’t give anyone a second glance. He can defend himself fine, if need be, and his attention remains entirely on the woman ahead of him.

She’s unremarkable, is the thing. Young, yes, but between the famous Gabriel Reyes and his companion, Ana Amari, she is quiet and unsmiling and blends into the walls behind her. From the way she leans back and watches her surroundings, Genji gets the impression that she prefers it this way, and indeed, when she sees him making his way towards her, she shifts, already bracing herself. Genji stifles a laugh.

“I do not mean to intrude,” he says as he approaches, stopping a respectable distance away. From the corner of his eye, he sees Ana Amari cast him a swift glance, almost unnoticeable, that he pretends not to see. “Perhaps you would like some company?”

“I am surprised your family would let you this close to me,” the woman answers, guarded, but she’s not very good at hiding her cards; her discomfort is spelled across her face, her body language, her words.

“Perhaps,” Genji says in the meantime, and he leans against the wall next to her, continuing to pick at his plate of finger foods. “It might surprise you that I am not fond of these parties any more than you. If I at least give semblance to conversation, my family will let me stay in the background for as long as I want.” He smiles at her; she doesn’t return it. “We do not need to speak, if you would prefer.”

She hums, but doesn’t say anything more. He doesn’t press and turns his eyes forward, disappointment curling coolly in his chest for reasons he refuses to explore in-depth. He doesn’t often seek out the company of specific people, but his upbringing means that most everyone loves to shower him with attention, and this – is unfamiliar. Still. He’s not sure what he expected, her being in Overwatch, and so he keeps quiet and watches the swell of people alongside her.

Eventually, though – five full minutes of silence, eventually – she says, “You are the younger brother, no?”

He rolls a grape between his fingers. “Yes. And you are?”

“I am one of Overwatch’s medics.”

She – doesn’t strike him as someone who would be at home in the battlefield. Here she wears a simple cream dress, flattering yet unassuming, gold jewelry and white sandals, white feathers woven into the strands of her braid, and her skin is flawless and unscarred. She is so young, too, so young to have a medical degree, and he says noncommittally, “That sounds difficult.”

“With how many injuries our people tend to sustain, you are not wrong.” She sips at a flute of champagne; he watches her lips (pink, lip gloss only, no makeup at all, in fact) press against the glass. “Your family generally doesn’t tend to help in that regard.”

“If you are fishing for an apology, I am not the right person to ask,” Genji says. He is one cog in the Shimada machine, and he has never faced Overwatch in combat before.

“I am aware.”

The conversation stops, then. Genji places the grape in his mouth and watches her thumb stroke the skin of her elbow, rhythmic and slow, and says nothing.

For a while, at least. The lull of silence itches at him, and eventually he asks, “Care for a dance?”

Even then he offers it idly, largely because Hanzo is starting to give him impatient looks; he knows that Genji is hiding away rather than conversing, and their father had specifically told them to take the opportunity to network. So far Genji has spoken to three people, one of whom is now giving him an uncertain look.

“Why?” she ventures.

“Why not?” he counters. He doesn’t have a good answer to her question anyway.

“You are a member of the yakuza and you could kill me where I stand,” she says primly.

He can’t keep back a snort. “If I wanted to do that, you would be dead already.” She gives him a flat look and he says, cajolingly, “Please? I’ll owe you a favor. I don’t want to talk to my family right now.”

“A favor,” she echoes, and he immediately starts to regret it when she nods and says, “For that, I’ll concede. Lead the way.”

So he does, offering his arm that she places her hand on, and he returns the look Ana Amari gives him with a small, sharp smile. Ana Amari narrows her eyes at him – she would definitely be watching him now – and he has to keep from laughing because he is not the biggest threat in this room, not by a long shot, yet he can still rub Shimada’s infamy in her face by dancing with one of her people. The irony is fantastic, and when he and the doctor take to the dancefloor, he’s already smiling.

Even more hysterically, she is a terrible dancer, and on a particularly memorable spin, a few feathers free themselves from her hair and float to the ground. One nestles into the breast pocket of his suit, but he’s too busy laughing to notice as he draws her back in.

“Practice makes perfect,” he says, and she rolls her eyes – but she’s smiling past the flush to her cheeks, and he thinks, almost distantly, that it’s a shame she’s so completely out of reach.

“My favor, then,” she says, and at his bemused look, she presses close and says, “Teach me to dance,” and he can’t refuse when she’s staring at him with those blue, blue eyes.

* * *

He doesn’t discover the feather again until the party is long past over, and he stares at the perfect white in his palm for a long, long time. Eventually, he turns the feather into a charm on a necklace and wears it beneath his clothes, close to his heart.

He’s not sure why it holds such value to him. Or rather, he is sure, but he’s carefully trying not to think about it. She is not nameless any longer, now that he's done his research: _Angela Ziegler_. Youngest surgeon-general in history. Medicinal prodigy. Employed by Overwatch during the omnic crisis, serving past that, and accompanying strike teams in the field.

To think, he had danced with her once. It’s silly how that thought brings a smile to his face, but he’ll never forget her now – never forget her smile.

**Author's Note:**

> come find me on [tumblr](https://snowsheba.tumblr.com/)!


End file.
